A scoffing noise escaped Eli’s throat. “You think I came in here to rob you?” He removed his hands from the counter and took a step back.
“What am I supposed to think?” Edgar said. “You haven’t been in my store for months, and suddenly you waltz in here, hoping to find me alone! Everyone knows you don’t like to work, and I sure as heck know you haven’t bought anything for a while. I don’t think you have any money, and that makes me wonder how desperate you are.”
“I came here to talk,” Eli said.
“Then talk,” Edgar replied.
“How about you show me your hands first,” Eli demanded. Edgar brought his hands up and rested them on the countertop. His right hand still held onto the gun. Eli sighed and looked him in the eye. “Jacob told me you gave him some money.”
“Are you seriously asking me for a hand-out, Eli? Ray has plenty of work; figure out your own means. I’m not giving you anything.”
“You didn’t give your nephew anything either,” Eli stated.
“Oh, really? How would you know?” Edgar flinched back when Eli took a sudden step toward the counter, ignoring the gun. He raised his hand and pointed at Edgar.
“Because I know who did give him that money. It wasn’t you.”
“You don’t know anything, boy.”
“Okay then, let’s go talk to David. Is he going to back up your lies?”
Edgar was silent, he could feel his cheek twitching. He replaced the gun under the counter but raised his chin and squared his shoulders.
Eli curled his lip and let out a short scoffing noise. “How could you let Jacob pay you back for something you never even gave him? Tell me, Edgar, which one of us is the thief here.” Eli’s grip tighten on the edge of the counter. “You need to tell him it wasn’t from you, or I will.”
“I’m not a thief,” Edgar muttered under his breath. “I’m giving that money to Angel.”
Eli’s hand shot out, grabbed Edgar by the shirt, and pulled him toward his face. “You mean your donation toward his surgery? You don’t get to take credit for that, either.” A sniveling gasp squeaked out of Edgar as he turned his head and cowered against Eli’s hold. Eli scowled at him for a moment and then pushed him away. As he turned to leave, he said over his shoulder, “Tell him the truth.”
Edgar smoothed out his shirt, snorting disgust over his mistreatment to hide his embarrassment. “That is my donation; I swear it is. I’ve been putting Jacob’s money into a savings account. Go ahead and ask David about that. It’s in Angel’s name.”
Eli turned and glared at him. “You think that’ll make up for what you’re doing? Jacob could have been using that money to take care of his family! You don’t get to make financial decisions for him. You need to come clean, Edgar.”
The two men stared at each other for a moment longer before Eli finally turned again and walked toward the exit, shaking his head.
“All right!” Edgar said, spitting out the words.
Eli paused briefly and then left the mercantile without looking back.
JOHN
Today was the last chance to give money toward the Martin baby’s surgery. John was holding out for this day. Jacob needed to wire his payment to Dr. Keeler in the morning, and Pastor Duncan had reminded the congregation of the deadline several times during the church meeting. John was waiting until the very end to give his contribution; he wanted to make sure everyone else got their money in before he did. He lingered after the service until there were only a few people left. The pastor and his wife were visiting with Jacob and Laura, while Louise Evans waited for them to be done. The Martins would take her home as soon as they finished their conversation.
He caught the pastor’s eye and indicated that he would wait by the office. As he walked down the hall, he glanced back to make sure the small group was distracted, and then slipped through the office door and walked up to Pastor Duncan’s cluttered desk.
After moving a stack of papers and several books, he found the Martins’ fundraising ledger. John grinned. He ran his eyes quickly down the list of names, noting each donation amount. He wanted specific information, but before he found it, a few other things caught his attention. All three widows, for one thing, had donated more than John would have thought possible. None of them gave a large amount, but their gifts were bigger than a strict budget should have allowed.
The next thing he noted was Edgar Johnson’s contribution. It was sizable compared to the majority, but he was family. Nevertheless, John tucked that number away in the back of his mind and continued to scan the list.
He finally found who he was looking for: Ray Larson, the second largest farm owner in East Haven. If anyone had given a large contribution, it would have been Ray. John took a mental note of his neighbor’s donation. Then on a whim, he added together Ray and Edgar’s gifts. He considered that total for a moment but decided to knock off a few dollars before settling on what he would give to the Martins.
He peeked toward the door. He could barely hear the conversation, but it still stretched on. John had time to check one more thing. He finished scanning over the list of names, and then just to be sure, he ran his eyes over them a second time. John sniffed back his contempt; there was a name missing. He wasn’t surprised. Even so, he had held onto a small bit of hope that he might be wrong. Every family in the church was represented on that ledger, every single family except one: the Gardners.
ELI
The March air was chilly, but the evening was clear. The Gardners had invited the Martins over for supper. Tomorrow morning Eli would take them to the train station in White Falls, and the little family would travel to Lambury. Ada had suggested having them over, hoping to relieve their workload as they packed for the trip. Eli realized the wisdom in her proposal after detecting a subtle anxiety lying under the surface of their conversation throughout the evening. Ada warmed some cider, and the men sat on the front porch after supper while the women visited inside. Eli could tell Jacob was pretending to be calmer than he was; he nervously picked at the arm of his chair while he sipped his drink.
“Dr. Keeler has done this procedure a hundred times,” Eli said, hoping to reassure him. “And Angel’s surgery is one of the least complicated. Try not to worry; in a couple of months, this will seem like ancient history.”
“I know,” Jacob said. “But before then, it’s going to be rough. Angel will be in a lot of pain and he’s not going to understand why. I keep thinking about how it will feel to watch my child suffer, knowing there’s nothing I can do to help. How does a parent deal with that?”
“You deal with it because you have to,” Eli said as he thought of Ruth Ann. “You do it by relying on God’s strength, not your own.”
Jacob sighed and rubbed his forehead. “I’ve been praying,” he said. “And I know I’ll be praying non-stop for as long as I’m Angel’s father. I think it goes along with the job.”
“It has to,” Eli agreed. “Being a father is one of the toughest jobs a man will ever have, but it’s also the most rewarding.”
“That’s a good point,” Jacob said through a tired laugh. “You and Ada will make great parents. You two should hurry up and have some kids. Being a father is like nothing else you’ll ever experience!”
“I know,” Eli said, glancing down for a moment before looking at Jacob again. “I’ll never forget what it felt like to hold our daughter, even though it was only for a few hours. And whether or not we have any more children isn’t up to us.”
“Oh… I didn’t know,” Jacob said quietly. “I’m sorry.”
Eli shook his head. “It was a long time ago. She would have been five next month.” He peered out at his yard and imagined Ruth Ann playing on the lawn. After a pause, he turned his attention back to Jacob and smiled. “We don’t know yet what God has planned, do we?” Eli patted him on the shoulder. “So, how is your uncle going to manage without you this next week?”
Jacob’s brows creased over his eyes. “I’m sure Edgar will ma
nage just fine,” he said. Eli noted the cool edge in his voice.
“What happened?” he asked, already suspecting the answer.
“A few months ago, he came by the house,” Jacob explained. “He said he didn’t give me any money after all. I don’t get it! Why would he say he did and allow me to pay him back? Who does that?” Jacob sighed and crossed his arms. “At least he didn’t keep it. He put it into a savings account for us. But still! It was a lousy thing to do.”
“It was lousy,” Eli agreed. “But we’re all vulnerable to temptation. Your uncle must be struggling with something. Somewhere deep inside, he must have felt bad about his actions or he wouldn’t have told you about it, and he wouldn’t have given back the money. Let’s pray the Holy Spirit is working in him.”
“Yeah well, I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to trust him again,” Jacob admitted. “I’m still angry; I’m not sure I can forgive him.”
“God requires us to forgive, Jacob; if you don’t, then why should He forgive you? You’ll have to figure out how to let this one go—but forgiving him doesn’t mean you have to trust him. Edgar will have to earn that back himself.”
“I’m trying, Eli; I really am,” Jacob said, “but it’s hard. Maybe he regrets keeping me on at the same pay. I know I’m slower. I’m sure it’s difficult to pay me as much as he does when I only get half the work done. I probably shouldn’t be working at the mercantile, but I don’t know what else to do. Who’s going to hire me?”
“Have you considered a desk job?” Eli asked. “Maybe you should talk to David. Even if he doesn’t have any work for you, he might have some ideas.”
Jacob nodded at the suggestion and sighed. “I’ll talk to him when I get back.”
“Speaking of that, you and Laura should head home; we have an early start tomorrow,” Eli reminded him.
“Yeah,” Jacob agreed. “Listen, thanks for taking us to the train station—and for supper tonight. That helped Laura out a lot! You two are good friends. We really appreciate everything you’ve done for us.”
Eli smiled as they stood up. “You’d have done the same, Jacob.”
The men moved their conversation inside, knowing it would take several more minutes for the women to wrap up their visit.
HAROLD
Harold scratched his chin as he glanced at the information in front of him. He was in awe every time he looked at a report on Eli’s capital gains. The young man, now almost twenty-one, had invested in several different companies, properties, and inventions over the last four years, all of which had done well. And this report…well, this was yet another surprise. He himself would not have bet on it.
Eli had two accounts with Harold. The first one, his largest, had been opened with the banknotes found in the woods. His second was the one Jed had opened for him. Mr. Gardner came into the bank one day with a pocket full of coins and crumpled notes. Eli had been trying to pay him back for something he didn’t want to be paid back for, and the man decided to put the money into an account. Eli was frustrated when he first found out, and it took him several weeks to accept that Jed wouldn’t take his money. But after a while, he gave up his protests and thanked him. He added to it after every market season or whenever Mrs. Perry paid him for a job he had done. As the account increased, he asked Harold to invest a portion of it into several ventures. Some were low-risk, and some were medium-risk, but all were extremely successful, and the account grew quickly.
Eli seemed to have a natural gift when it came to money. He knew exactly where to invest it, but more impressively, he knew exactly when to pull it back out. Eli was so successful that Harold had been tempted to follow his investment trail with his own money. He was smart enough to pray over the idea, though, and ask God if it was something he should do. God’s answer, which Harold felt deep in his heart, was a resounding no. So, Harold decided to make his own investment choices before showing the options to Eli. He wrote them down to eliminate any temptation to change them, especially when they differed from Eli’s choices. God blessed Harold’s diligence by allowing most of his investments to have an overall upward trend, but none of them matched the boy’s success.
Harold was impressed with the rate of growth in Eli’s smaller account over the years and laughed at himself for continuing to call it small. But the growth in the larger account was not only impressive, it was extraordinary! Eli had invested some of the money from the banknotes into the same ventures as his lesser account, and those parallel investments created a steady growth for each account. What made the larger one so remarkable, however, were the investments which the boy isolated to that account. He chose high-risk ventures and moved the money from the banknotes between so many different investments that, if it weren’t for his uncanny success rate, Harold would have thought he was being reckless.
He remembered the first time the boy had done this. Harold had selected a stack of investment choices for Eli to look at. He had mixed a variety of risk into the pile just to see what he would do with it all. After studying the information for a few minutes, Eli pointed to one of them, insisting Harold invest a substantial amount from his bigger account.
“That’s a high-risk investment, Eli. Even with the potential of a high return, I didn’t think you would choose that one. I only put it in there to see if you’d recognize it for what it is.”
“I do; it has a high return,” the boy said.
“It has a high risk,” Harold pointed out. “That’s what you need to consider. High-risk means the high return may not happen. You could lose a lot of money.”
“I could make even more,” Eli countered. “I thought that’s what you were trying to teach me.”
“I’m trying to teach you how to grow your money responsibly. Are you being a good steward of your money by taking such a high risk?”
“Mr. Ross, it isn’t my money. If God wants it to grow, it will. I can’t explain it, but this investment is the right choice. It feels like a good investment.”
“You can’t make your choices based on your feelings, Eli,” the banker insisted.
“Why not? It works for me. And not just with the money. Please, let me try it.”
Harold decided to let him. If he lost the money it would be a hard but important lesson. However, Eli didn’t lose it that time—or the next time—or the next time after that. And even with all those successes, Harold still sat at his desk, rubbing his chin in wonder. Eli’s wealth had grown at an unprecedented rate in a short amount of time. Harold had never seen anything like it. He had to give God the credit; there was no other explanation.
He gathered the paperwork in front of him. In a few hours, that blessed young man would be sitting in Harold’s office discussing the latest state of his accounts. Eli would soon be a father, and the baby’s arrival was an understandable distraction. But hopefully Harold could draw the soon-to-be father’s mind out of his future excitement in order to conduct a small amount of business today.
ELI
The mid-September glow in the early evening sky cast a golden hue on the hills as Eli walked home from the Larson farm. Over the past several weeks, he was able to get a considerable amount of repairs and preparations done for his friend. Ray had commented that this fall’s harvest was stacking up to be one of the smoothest yet. He couldn’t imagine running into any bumps or hitches for the rest of the season, thanks to Eli’s help.
That morning, Eli talked to Ray about having some time off. He wanted to take Ada to Oak Springs for their yearly visit with the caravan later in the month. Ray assured him that the timing would not be a problem and once again gave him the okay to leave. While walking home, Eli’s mind drifted to their travel plans.
As he rounded the bend, he saw Isaac walking along the road leading away from the Miller farm. Isaac waved as he approached. Eli waited for him, and they walked the rest of the way home together.
“Hey, Eli! Are you heading over to the church tonight?” he asked.
“What for?”
; “For John’s meeting, of course,” Isaac said.
“John Miller? I don’t know anything about it.”
“Well you should come anyway. I’m sure he won’t mind.”
“What’s the meeting about?” Eli asked.
“I don’t know exactly, some sort of investment. John seems to think I’ll be interested. But if it’s that good, we should both take a look. What do you say?”
Eli hesitated. “Is David going to be there?”
“I don’t know that either,” Isaac said, laughing. “Come on, it might be worth it. I’m going home to change and then I’m heading over there. Let Ada know you might be late for supper and come with me.”
“Okay,” Eli said. “This should be interesting.”
The men went into their homes, changed out of their work clothes, and walked into town. When they got to the church, Eli made a quick note of who was and who wasn’t there. Most notably absent were David, Marcus, and Ray. He also noticed the disdain on John’s face when he saw Eli walk into the building.
“What are you doing here?” John blurted out.
“Isaac invited me.”
“Of course he did,” John said, narrowing his eyes.
The men settled into their seats and John began to talk. Eli listened as the farmer explained a too-good-to-be-true product to the group. Throughout his speech, John avoided looking at Eli, even though he sat in the front pew. After listening for a few minutes, Eli didn’t need to hear any more. He tried to wait for a pause in the presentation, but the more John spoke, the more Eli was unable to hold his tongue.
“Miracle Corn?” he interjected. “Come on, you can’t be serious!”
John finally looked at him. “It’s just a catchy name to help market it,” he said slowly, as though explaining a difficult concept to a child. “This company is above board, Eli. Their corn has a forty percent higher yield than other corn; it’s all science. Look, I know this is probably hard for you to wrap your brain around, but these men can invest in the company as well as in the seed itself. They’ll get returns as the company grows and from their higher crop yields. That means more profit in their pockets all around. You see? This meeting really wasn’t intended for you.”
Painted Vessels Page 24
